The next big business trend that we are going to see, and that is happening already, is not only that aboriginal businesses are going to be stronger components of the corporate supply chain, but we are also going to see them as stronger proponents of equity positions and actual partners within resource projects.

JP Gladu of the Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business discusses native participation in resource industries...Read More

Posts tagged ‘GTA Resources and Mining Inc (GTA)’

Perspectives differ on 2018 small cap performance

by Greg Klein

Not everyone agrees, but some sources represent 2018 as a comeback year for mining and exploration.(Photo: PwC Junior Mine 2018)

It was the best of times, the worst of times or some middling but still promising times—you’d have the dickens of a time trying to reconcile these conflicting viewpoints. Such was the state of junior miners this past year, when varying fortunes eluded generalization. Just how the sector performed depended on who did the talking.

Outright despair came from Peter Clausi last October, as the CEO of GTA Resources and Mining TSXV:GTA discussed the company’s proposal to sell its assets amid a change of business:

In this difficult Canadian mining environment, it was almost impossible for the board not to come to this decision. The lackluster commodity markets, the depressed public market for junior explorers and the severe challenge of raising further capital all contributed to this decision. We believe GTA’s shareholders will be better served in a growth industry other than junior exploration.

Not every CEO would turn a press release into such a cri de coeur, but stats show GTA’s hardly alone. Evaluating 378 mining and other companies with market caps ranging from $4 million to $588 million, the S&P/TSX Venture Composite Index shows a nearly 35% drop in valuations since the relatively heady days of last January.

Yet an entirely different perspective came from PricewaterhouseCoopers in December, with the 2018 edition of its annual Junior Mine report. Unlike the S&P/TSXV Composite, this data focuses only on miners and comes from 12 months ending June 30. Furthermore it examines the Venture’s top 100 miners by market cap, a selection that could tilt results in favour of success.

And a degree of success PwC found, with the aggregate valuation growing to $12.9 billion, a 6% increase over the previous year, the third consecutive annual increase and the best performance “since the heydays of 2011.”

Not just the top 100, but Venture miners and explorers overall increased their total market caps by 5% to $21.1 billion, PwC reported.

Even so they were outperformed by cannabis, fintech and cryptocurrencies. “As a result, mining companies’ share of the TSXV’s total value declined to 43.8%, down from 47.4% a year earlier. Nevertheless, mining remains by far the dominant sector on the exchange, with life sciences (13%), finance (11%) and technology (9%) representing the next-largest industries by valuation.”

Investors favoured top 100 companies moving from development into production, while royalty streaming and the energy metals lithium, cobalt and nickel took on greater prominence at gold’s expense.

Financing for Venture miners overall rose 6.5% to $2.7 billion, almost $2.2 billion of that from equities that mostly went to explorers and development-stage companies, PwC stated. Companies in the production stage increasingly turned to debt financing, which rose 65.9% over the previous 12-month period.

Fifty-one of the top 100 raised more than $10 million apiece, while 10 companies each raked in over $50 million.

Apart from market caps and financings, spending provides another guide to the sector’s health. Some upbeat numbers came in October from Natural Resources Canada, following a survey of companies’ 2018 commitments for Canadian projects. If all went to plan, exploration expenditures for the year came to $2.36 billion, an 8% increase over 2017 and the highest amount since 2012. Juniors, struggling or not, accounted for over 45% of the total commitments.

With coffers at their fullest in seven years, equity and debt financings on the rise and commodity prices relatively stable, the industry has entered a long-awaited period of opportunity.—The PwC Junior Mine 2018 report

The exploration category included engineering, economic, feasibility and environmental studies, as well as general expenses. All that’s part of the much larger category of total Canadian mineral resource development investments, which totalled $11.86 billion this year, compared with $10.61 billion in 2017, NRCan found.

In fact Canada leads an encouraging global trend among juniors, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence. Using different methodology, the group found budgets for nonferrous exploration leaping by 19% worldwide this year to hit $10.1 billion. Juniors showed the highest budget jump at 35%, their first increase since 2012.

Canadian companies lead the world in nonferrous exploration, boasting a 31% budget increase this year, leaving Australia and the U.S. in second and third place, S&P added.

Of course all that can sound like smiley-faced consolation to companies struggling with jurisdictional difficulties, commodity performance, investor negativity or other challenges. But in an industry not always shy about basking in reflected glory, the continuing success of some companies must offer reassurance to the sector as a whole.

An option on the Ivanhoe gold project passes from GTA Resources and Mining TSXV:GTA to Probe Metals TSXV:PRB, allowing GTA to concentrate on its Northshore flagship. Announced April 29, the deal costs Probe $234,000 and 350,000 shares, out of which GTA gets $134,000, 200,000 shares and a 1% NSR. GTA will issue 200,000 shares to the northern Ontario property’s original vendors. The acquisition increases Probe’s West Porcupine project by about 130 square kilometres, to total over 180 square kilometres.

That leaves GTA with a stronger focus on its Northshore gold property in the Hemlo greenstone belt, where the company has additional drilling planned. GTA holds a 51% interest in Northshore and acts as operator in a JV with Balmoral Resources TSX:BAR. GTA has been examining the potential for low-cost mining on a near-surface, high-grade area of the project’s Afric zone.

The Ivanhoe sale “allows GTA to recover much of its expenditures over the last two years while maintaining an upside by receiving shares of Probe, and by retaining an NSR on any future production,” commented president/CEO Wayne Reid. “The company can now concentrate its immediate efforts on evaluating the economics of the open pit potential of the Afric zone. We believe capital requirements would be minimal if contract mining, hauling and milling can be utilized.”

GTA also holds the Auden graphite project in central Ontario and the Burnt Pond copper-zinc project in Newfoundland.

Overseas investors once again get to meet Canadian juniors in person, as prospect generator Zimtu Capital TSXV:ZC and 11 of its holdings visit four European cities from November 5 to 11. Now in the event’s fifth year, company reps will hold conferences in Munich, Geneva, Zurich and Frankfurt to largely institutional audiences, demonstrating the wide-ranging interest in exploration opportunities.

“Essentially it’s a commitment by Zimtu and all the participating companies to keep the European investor informed about what the companies are doing, to meet the management and form a relationship with the guys who are going to be making the decisions, effectively spending their money,” says Zimtu president Dave Hodge.

“Many of the investors who are still interested in the sector had made great money in the past and experienced tremendous upside in some stocks. Certainly the Canadian junior market is very unique globally and provides that opportunity for the European investor to speculate on discovery.”

Describing himself as a “grizzled veteran of the Zimtu bus,” Chris Berry acts as MC, moderator and keynote speaker. The president of House Mountain Partners and co-editor of the Disruptive Discoveries Journal says, “I like to go back and get a sense of what institutional investors in those cities are thinking about, not just about commodity markets but central bank policies and the macro economy.”

His talk will briefly review the perspectives he offered last year then “challenge the audience” with four questions to consider in 2016. “It’s really more of a discussion than a lecture and I hope there’s a lot of pushback and debate. That gets people thinking and hopefully planning for better times next year.”

While the downturn’s all too obvious, several Zimtu holdings have made impressive strides over the last year. Some of the more remarkable stories include the creation of ALX Uranium TSXV:AL after Lakeland Resources and Alpha Exploration won overwhelming shareholder approval to combine their companies. The result is a distinguished team overseeing one of the Athabasca Basin’s largest and most prospective portfolios.

Competing for flagship status are a number of drill-ready projects including Kelic Lake, where a rig’s currently at work. Gibbon’s Creek has a ground gravity survey underway to follow up on last winter’s 2,550-metre program on a property hosting some of the Basin’s highest radon levels. The company’s Carter Lake and Hook Lake properties feature around 15 kilometres of untested corridors on strike with the Patterson Lake South, Arrow and Spitfire discoveries. Other drill-ready projects include Newnham Lake and Lazy Edward Bay, a 60% stake in the Carpenter Lake joint venture and an 80% share of the Gorilla JV.

Well financed for additional campaigns, the ALX team has been poring over property data to further establish priorities.

Commerce Resources addresses last year’s Munich conference.

Focusing on a rare earths project with relatively simple mineralogy, Commerce Resources TSXV:CCE continues to make progress with drilling, metallurgy and community engagement as its Ashram deposit in northern Quebec moves towards pre-feasibility. Last month the company increased rare earth elements recovery from 71% to 76% at a high grade of 42% total rare earth oxides, while also simplifying the plant’s flowsheet. The most impressive concentrates so far have graded 48.9% TREO at 63% recovery and 45.7% TREO at 71% recovery.

Eager to make contact with potential buyers, Electra bought and shipped an 18-tonne cargo of jade to Shanghai in September and is now preparing a second shipment. The company also produces chalky geyserite, or aluminum silica, from a Vancouver Island quarry. The product’s U.S. customer collaborated with Electra on a drill program last summer to study the project’s expansion potential.

Located eight kilometres on strike from Teck Resources’ (TSX:TCK.A and TCK.B) Duck Pond mine, Burnt Pond is “underlain by the same geological package of altered felsic volcanic rocks,” the company added. The new ground features what third parties have interpreted as a 500-metre-long zinc- and lead-rich stringer sulphide zone.

The zinc market appears ready for a strong rebound in both demand and pricing and this represents an opportunistic low-cost entry into this market, with no option commitments or future royalties payable.—Wayne Reid, president/CEO of GTA Resources and Mining

2001 drilling featured a best result of 0.79% copper, 24% lead, 25.8% zinc, 791.1 grams per tonne silver and 1.6 g/t gold over 0.37 metres at a vertical depth of 405 metres, GTA stated. With limited historic drilling, extensive geophysical and geochemical surveys show untested electromagnetic targets coinciding with anomalous base metals in rock and soils.

“The existing targets can be easily advanced to a drill stage with the use of more modern technology,” said GTA president/CEO Wayne Reid. “The zinc market appears ready for a strong rebound in both demand and pricing and this represents an opportunistic low-cost entry into this market, with no option commitments or future royalties payable.”

After compiling previous work, plans call for gravity and EM surveys with drilling anticipated late this year.

Last month GTA reported gold samples up to 1.13 g/t from its Ivanhoe project west of Timmins. The company’s flagship is its Northshore project on the Hemlo-Schreiber Greenstone Belt. Having earned a 51% interest in the joint venture with Balmoral Resources TSX:BAR, GTA is considering the project’s potential for a small-scale contract mining operation.

Sample results reported July 20 by GTA Resources and Mining TSXV:GTA confirm gold associated with induced polarization anomalies at the Ivanhoe project in Ontario. Summer field work collected 83 rock samples and 47 soil samples, with rock samples ranging from less than 5 ppb to 1.13 grams per tonne gold.

Among the grab samples were grades of 0.75 g/t and 1.13 g/t found near the western end of the 500-metre-long Montana high resistivity zone. Samples reported from the area last year reached as high as 4.81 g/t.

A quartz float sample at the BP porphyry zone graded up to 1.13 g/t and was found 180 metres northeast of a float that last year graded 18.1 g/t gold. Of 15 soil samples from an area approximately 200 metres by 500 metres, seven showed anomalous results ranging from seven to 102 ppb gold.

GTA has drilling planned for autumn. The 13,258-hectare property features an interpreted extension of the Porcupine Destor fault zone and the northeast extension of the interpreted trend hosting the Borden Lake gold discovery acquired earlier this year by Goldcorp TSX:G through its takeover of Probe Mines.

GTA’s flagship is the 337-hectare Northshore project on the Hemlo-Schreiber Greenstone Belt. An engineering study announced last month examined a possible small-scale, low-cost open pit operation. The company has completed a 51% earn-in on the project, a joint venture with Balmoral Resources TSX:BAR.

GTA Resources considers mining near-surface, high-grade Ontario gold

by Greg Klein

For the majors, the really big new gold deposits seem more and more elusive. But GTA Resources and Mining TSXV:GTA thinks it might have found enough low-hanging fruit to make a substantial impact on a small-cap company. Recently optimized high-grade pit shells have GTA examining the possibility of low-cost production at the Northshore project, 125 kilometres west of Hemlo.

A program of shallow infill drilling would help determine the viability of small-scale mining at GTA’s Northshore project.

“We knew we had a high-grade zone within the Afric deposit,” CEO Wayne Reid says of Northshore’s June 2014 resource estimate. “And we wanted to know what could be put in shallow pits as a high-grade resource because it might be very simple to mine this stuff in an open pit with very little stripping and truck it to an existing mill.”

In a joint venture with Balmoral Resources TSX:BAR, GTA has completed a 51% earn-in and acts as operator of the 337-hectare project on the Hemlo-Schreiber Greenstone Belt. Based on 52 holes totalling 11,390 metres, the Afric zone’s resource used a 0.5 gram-per-tonne cutoff to show:

Intrigued by the high-grade areas close to surface, GTA commissioned an engineering study that detailed two pit shells within the existing resource. In results released this month, two options were provided within each shell, with those for the West area showing:

Pit Pws 28

indicated: 56,825 tonnes averaging 2.92 g/t for 5,335 ounces

Pit Pws 31

indicated: 100,665 tonnes averaging 2.8 g/t for 9,062 ounces

For the East area, the two options showed:

Pit Pws 28

inferred: 62,809 tonnes averaging 2.86 g/t for 5,775 ounces

Pit Pws 31

indicated: 91,449 tonnes averaging 2.38 g/t for 6,998 ounces

inferred: 287,060 tonnes averaging 2.63 g/t for 24,273 ounces

For both East and West areas, pit 28 totals 5,335 ounces indicated and 5,775 ounces inferred. Pit 31’s total comes to 16,060 ounces indicated and 24,273 ounces inferred. The strip ratio for each pit came to 0.5 and 0.8 respectively.

If a low-cost mining scenario proves possible, such numbers could offer significant opportunity for a company like GTA, Reid says. An affable Newfoundlander who’s been a professional geologist for close to 40 years, he looks back on a career largely focused on Archean gold deposits, mainly in the Timmins camp but also in Red Lake, along with base metals and uranium experience.

Reid spent over 20 years in senior roles with the Noranda/Hemlo group. He’s also served as manager of Canadian exploration for Echo Bay Mines and exploration manager for St. Andrew Goldfields TSX:SAS, in addition to positions with other companies. Reid initially staked and began exploration at Brewery Creek and took part in the team that sunk the first holes in Newfoundland’s Boundary deposit, which became the Duck Pond mine.

Looking at Northshore’s optimized pits, he says, “I think that if our preliminary numbers can be verified you could have a good profit without needing a lot of capital. What we need to do now is put some economic numbers on that and also firm up those ounces.”

To accomplish that, Reid wants to do shallow infill drilling, baseline environmental studies and a mini-bulk sample ranging from 10,000 to 50,000 tonnes, depending on what permitting allows. A four-kilometre road linking to the Trans-Canada Highway would need upgrading. “We’ve already talked to some existing mills within a 150-kilometre radius of the deposit,” Reid says.

With $600,000 now in the till, GTA hopes to raise more money soon through a flow-through share offering which would allow further work to resume around mid-summer.

I think it would take one key person to co-ordinate it. After that, it’s all contracting—the mining, the trucking, the milling.—Wayne Reid, CEO of GTA Resources and Mining

While the Hemlo-Schreiber Greenstone Belt discovery remains GTA’s flagship, the company’s also active farther east, between Timmins and the Borden Lake deposit acquired by Goldcorp TSX:G earlier this year. Now in the second year of a 100% option on the Ivanhoe project, GTA expanded its claims by 40% over the last year to compile a 13,258-hectare land package. An interpreted extension of the Destor Porcupine fault zone extends across the northern part of the property.

Last year’s prospecting identified four areas of gold mineralization on the Destor Porcupine break and a porphyry trend. Samples graded up to 4.1 g/t and 18.1 g/t. Magnetometer and induced polarization surveys followed, with IP finding several high resistivity and chargeability targets that appear to coincide with the mineralized areas. With additional fieldwork to come, drilling is tentatively planned for late summer or early fall.

In Reid’s home province and near the Duck Pond mine he helped explore, GTA optioned claims earlier this month that comprise part of the Burnt Pond zinc-copper property. “We’re going to do a geophysical program to better identify some VMS or base metals targets and get ready to drill them,” he says. The plan is to take advantage of Newfoundland’s 50% rebate on exploration costs. Surveys could begin in summer or fall.

Back in Ontario but currently on the backburner is GTA’s Auden property, immediately south of Zenyatta Ventures’ (TSXV:ZEN) Albany graphite project.

If all goes well at Northshore, the high-grade, near-surface areas could potentially “make serious money for our market cap,” Reid emphasizes. For the exploration company to go into production, “we would have to get the right people in the right places,” he explains. “I think it would take one key person to co-ordinate it. After that, it’s all contracting—the mining, the trucking, the milling.”

He adds, “Now if someone wanted to take it out and buy it from us, we’d be open to that also.”

An agreement with Zimtu Capital TSXV:ZC announced June 4 would allow GTA Resources and Mining TSXV:GTA to earn a 100% interest in two licences comprising part of central Newfoundland’s Burnt Pond zinc-copper property. The project sits within the Tally Pond volcanic belt that hosts Teck Resources’ (TSX:TCK.A and TCK.B) Duck Pond mine, as well as other copper-zinc-silver-gold massive sulphide deposits.

Duck Pond began commercial production in 2007, producing copper and zinc concentrates that are trucked to the port of St. Georges on Newfoundland’s west coast. Burnt Pond features “the same geological package of altered felsic volcanic rocks as are common to the Duck Pond mine,” Zimtu stated. The property has untested electromagnetic targets coinciding with anomalous base metals in rock and soils. “Anomalous base metal values associated with the VMS-style alteration include the Wim showing (1.9% zinc, 1.5% lead) and drill intersections of 1% zinc over 2.9 metres.”

Zimtu receives $3,055 on signing and 1.2 million GTA shares within a week of TSXV approval. Zimtu acquired the claims through staking. The company “provides mineral property project generation and advisory services, and helps to connect companies with mineral properties of interest,” Zimtu stated.

GTA holds three projects in northern Ontario: the 51%-owned Northshore gold project, the 100%-owned Auden graphite project and the Ivanhoe gold project, in which GTA has an option to acquire 100%.

Disclaimer: Zimtu Capital Corp is a client of OnPage Media Corp, the publisher of ResourceClips.com. The principals of OnPage Media may hold shares in Zimtu Capital.

Kapuskasing Gold wants to prove, once again, that Mike Tremblay’s right about Ontario’s newest gold district

He might have spent over 20 years as a voice crying in the Kapuskasing wilderness, but prospector Mike Tremblay saw his theories validated by a 2010 discovery on property he staked. That was the Borden Lake project in what Probe Mines TSXV:PRB calls Ontario’s newest gold district, the Kapuskasing structural zone. Now as an adviser to Kapuskasing Gold TSXV:KAP, Tremblay wants to open up more of this almost unexplored region.

The Kapuskasing zone sits tantalizingly close to a number of gold camps. Yet it’s received surprisingly little attention. Having grown up in the nearby town of Chapleau, Tremblay says locals often asked, “Why do we have mines all around us but there’s no mines here?” His response: “It was because of this great big Kapuskasing structure that nobody was exploring in.”

Tremblay says he was “lucky enough to learn from really smart people, the kind of people who would take you under their wing and teach you.” But something about the region close to home intrigued him. “I always had that contrary, stubborn streak in me, so you couldn’t tell me that something wasn’t possible.”

While working with Noranda Mines he learned about a VMS target that the company walked away from. Tremblay staked it in 1987, lost it at one point, re-staked it and, along with partner Jack Robert, finally sold it to Probe.

That was in March 2010. By June of that year the company had flown a VTEM survey. That summer they hit, eventually announcing a 91-metre intercept averaging two grams per tonne gold from one of six near-surface mineralized holes over a potential 250-metre strike.

Vindicated, Tremblay and his collaborators sought new turf in the Kapuskasing. Meanwhile by January 2013 Probe revealed a global resource of 5.19 million ounces indicated and 1.18 million ounces inferred. In May of last year Agnico Eagle TSX:AEM took a 9.9% stake in Probe. Then in November Tremblay, Robert and Probe won the 2013 Ontario Prospectors Association Award. The OPA credited the “new and unique discovery” to the fact that Tremblay and the others showed themselves “undaunted by dogma.”

Early this year Tremblay and his staking team sold two more properties, “my dream concepts in the area,” to Olympic Resources. He also joined as an adviser, helping transform the company into Kapuskasing Gold.

The acquisitions are Borden North, two claim blocks totalling 6,800 hectares by the Kapuskasing zone’s eastern margin about 60 kilometres north of Probe’s resource, and Rollo, a 7,136-hectare property just east of the zone.

“On Borden North there’s a big S-fold up in the mafic volcanics, so if there was anything it would fatten out in the fold, it would be a structural trap,” Tremblay explains. “When KAP got involved, we staked ground around it to cover all the potential.”

“Rollo was another one that I generated,” he adds. “I once worked with a prospector in his 80s. He was 18 years old in 1933, when they made some big discoveries in the region. So he had intimate knowledge of the area and he told me about this gold showing on a portage on what is now the Rollo project. So when that ground came open, 20 years after he passed on, I remembered he talked about a porphyry on that portage where he panned gold. That was the enticement to get the other guys to put in money.”